Dan: Nor do I. Apparently I'm not making myself clear. I read the words and they seem clear. Perhaps something is being lost between the words and the reading is all I can assume.
[Case] I was suggesting that a "retreat" could be anything from a business meeting to a peyote ritual. I more or less hoped this would prompt some explanation or insight into your specific practice. If this is too narrow for you, I'm sure the definition can be stretched to accommodate whatever you like. It was your term after all. >[Case] >I assumed from what you said originally that this was not a structured kind >of event. But it would surprise me greatly to hear that certain forms and >practices are not adhered to. I would suggest that the peyote ceremony >Pirsig talks about was a kind of retreat as well. Dan: It is very difficult for people from Western cultures to understand. We think that we do. But anything we think we know, we don't. I suspect you would be greatly surprised. [Case] I don't think I know. Does that mean I really do? You are from a western culture. How do you understand it? Surprise me. >[Case] >I used to listen to this on the radio. I never attended on of these >services in person but that is the part that would crack me up. Dan: Why would anyone find humor in larceny? [Case] Well the guy kind of chuckled when he said it and there was the murmur of the congregation laughing in the background. But how is passing a collection plate during a religious service larcenous? Dan: I have no teacher. How can anyone teach that which I already know? Your question does not make sense. As Platt might say, you're just being querulous. [Case] I apologize for referring to your advisor as a teacher. I meant the giggling guy living in the rock hut. How is the material condition of the advisor relevant to the advice? Or if you prefer, how is the material condition of the practitioner relevant the practice? People in Brown's audience claim to experience religious ecstasy. They say they have been guided into an encounter with the living God of the New Testament. They say He speaks to them and answers their prayers. How would you evaluate such claims based on your experience? How would you recommend that someone who has had neither, evaluate either? By their bank accounts? >[Case] >My "self" is empirically available to me. I trust that yours is >empirically available to you. Dan: No, its not. Your trust is misplaced. If my self was empirically available I would know where it is and what it is. I don't. I put it to you that your self is not empirically available to you either. If it is, again, please tell me where it is. Tell me what it is. You say it is available to your senses so that shouldn't be difficult. [Case] I am sorry to hear that my trust was misplaced. But it is "your" self, not mine. If you are sorry to have mislaid it, I mourn your loss. If you are glad it's gone, let us rejoice. All I can infer of "your" self, or lack there of, is what you reveal through your writing. As for "my" self, it is empirically available to "me". It is available through (not to) "my" senses to me, firsthand. That is what empirical means. "Self" is a term I use by convention to refer to the subset of events known only to "me" in this way. It is my memories, my stored experience. It is the genetic history of my species squeezed through a sequence of events in this region of space and time. "My" self is a shard of Atman. This shard is "i" "i" am clay animated by the breath of God. "i" am Son and Father. "i" am Citizen. "i" am Hypocrite "i" am Sinner "i" am the torch atop my neck; "i" am the lamp of a foolish bridesmaid "i" am a bubble of mead in the beard of Odin "i" am the cellar where lay The corpses of Buddhas "i" have slain along The Way. "i" mark time "i" make plans "i" keep records "i" witness "i" am "my" own final judge. Dan: Please cite any reputable scientific evidence for the existence of self. [Case] Here is an interesting article on eight Tibetan monks who were tested at the University of Wisconsin. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A43006-2005Jan2.html Ok, perhaps this is more about what a non-self looks like scientifically. Googling "psychology self" I got several university sites, some self help stuff and an anemic Wiki. The studies come mostly from the psychoanalytic community, but there seems to be a consensus at least in those quarters as to what "self" means. What do you think that it doesn't mean? Dan: I did not say meaningless. I said self is an empty concept. That isn't meaningless. [Case] Ok, so what's it "mean" to you? moq_discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org.uk/pipermail/moq_discuss_archive/
